A variety of products currently exist on the market for providing drinking water for pets. Typically, pet owners provide a supply of drinking water to their pets by filling a reservoir, such as a bowl, with water and leaving the reservoir in a spot accessible by the pet. Once the pet consumes the entire contents of the reservoir, the reservoir needs to be manually refilled with water. The drawback of such products is that they require frequent, typically daily, replenishment by the owner. This presents a problem for owners who must leave their pets alone for periods of time.
Certain devices attempt to solve the above problem by providing alternative approaches for refilling the drinking water reservoir. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,971,331 issued to Rohrer, teaches water dispensing device having an open reservoir connected to a closed reservoir placed on top of the open reservoir, so that by force of gravity the water in the closed reservoir flows to and refills the open reservoir. A similar principle of gravity flow from a higher closed reservoir to a lower open reservoir is utilized in a device disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,843,205 issued to Segreto. Such gravity flow devices have a number of important drawbacks. First, the continuous water flow lasts only as long as the top closed reservoir contains water. Therefore, such devices are typically large, heavy, and cumbersome, since they incorporate a large water container sitting on top of the lower open reservoir. Unless mounted to a wall or otherwise properly supported, such devices risk being overturned by and hurting the pet. Moreover, the gravity flow design does not eliminate the need to consistently refill the reservoir, it simply prolongs the time between refills. Once the top reservoir is depleted, so is the supply of water and the owner needs to refill the top reservoir in order to continue the water flow.
Other devices provide a reservoir which is connected to a continuous supply of water. Such devices use mechanical flow valves similar to those found in toilet tanks to regulate the flow of water from the source to the reservoir. One major drawback of such devices it that the flow valves are prone to failure, resulting in water overflow. Likewise, overflow results when a pet overturns the reservoir, since the water continues to flow even once the device is not in a horizontal position.